Hartford Union Station

Building

The station is located on the western edge of downtown Hartford, on a three-acre (1.2 ha) block between Union Place and Spruce Street on the east and west and Church and Asylum streets to the north and south. Opposite the main building on Union Place are a mixture of other old buildings and parking lots. To the west is a triangular parking lot and the viaduct carrying Interstate 84 and U.S. Route 6, which curves around the north of the station as well. Across Asylum on the south is Bushnell Park, also listed on the Register.

The main building is located between the tracks and Union Place. It is a three-story rectangular building in rough-faced Portland brownstone with two smaller, similarly shaped two-story wings on the north and south. The main building has a flat roof; the wings are gabled and tiled, with dormer windows piercing them at regular intervals.

On the east (front) facade, a wide set of steps rises to the main entrance, beneath a flat hood at the springlines of three of the large segmental arches that run across the first story. Above these is a stylized floral molded course. The second story has similar but smaller segmental arches set with a recessed panel and four-pane windows. The central bay has "1914" carved into its panel; all others are blank. The two wings have four-pane rectangular windows.

At the station level were originally four tracks (currently one) divided by a middle platform. Two sets of iron roofs create a train shed. On the wall side those roofs are supported by spiral-shaped iron brackets. In the middle columns and simple curved iron brackets support the trusses that hold up the shed roof.

The interior has been remodeled since the station was rebuilt. It is a mostly open area with stairs along the west wall leading up to the elevated tracks and benches along the east. Flooring is red tile. There are offices on the north and south; some look out over the main space.

History

The station was built in 1889, and served the Hartford and New Haven Railroad, Central New England Railway, Hartford and Connecticut Valley Railroad (all of which were acquired by the New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad) and the New York and New England Railroad, but the entire structure had to be rebuilt after a fire in 1914. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places as "Hartford Union Station" in 1975.

The station is currently served by 1 track and platform. The second track and platform were removed by Amtrak in the 1990s to reduce maintenance costs and because the underlying structure is no longer strong enough to support more than one train at a time. A 260 foot (79 m) section of the platform was converted to high level for accessible boarding as part of the Hartford Line project. It features a 29-inch (740 mm)-wide hinged edge that can be flipped up to allow wide freight trains to pass. The new platform opened on August 4, 2016.

The I-84 Hartford Project may require realigning the highway and rail line, in which case new platforms would be constructed on the new alignment, though Union Station would continue to be used for ticketing and waiting area.

Amtrak

Hartford is situated midway along the New Haven - Springfield Line, a non-electrified line that branches off the electrified Northeast Corridor near New Haven. Amtrak operates three services through Hartford, with a total of about six trains per day in each direction. Northeast Regional and Vermonter run through from Washington, D.C., with an engine change at New Haven; Shuttle connect with other Northeast Regionals at New Haven.

CTfastrak

Union Station serves as the northeastern terminus for CTfastrak, a bus rapid transit system operating between the station and Downtown New Britain station in New Britain in central Connecticut. Operated by Connecticut Transit, CTfastrak opened on March 28, 2015, after fifteen years of planning and three years of construction. Five local and four express routes operate along the busway and over on-street loops in downtown Hartford.

Buses and shuttles

CTTransit's Hartford Division provides bus service to the station on a variety of routes, including lines 30, 60, 62, 64, 66, 72, 74, 76, 82, 83, 84, 101, 102, 128, 950, and DASH.

Other providers at Union Station are Greyhound, Peter Pan, and Connecticut Limo.

Planned service

The states of Connecticut and Massachusetts are planning to establish the Hartford Line, a commuter rail service from New Haven to Springfield that will use the current Amtrak line, with a possible shuttle bus connection in Windsor Locks for Bradley International Airport. As of December 2015, funding has been secured to finance the construction of the new line, with service scheduled to begin in early 2018.